__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

Based on what I can tell from HL2's textures VS the visuals in-game, the secret to photo-realism is to start with bland photo-sourced textures, fully flesh out your buildings even if it means wasting polys on details that aren't very noticible, have one hell of a lighting engine under the hood, and put lots of piles of trash everywhere. Because only reality has litterbugs in it!